


love you (when you're such a mess)

by blueschist



Series: post-canon edoryo stories [3]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! GX
Genre: Depression, Dissociation, Gen, Intrusive Thoughts, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Suicidal Thoughts, accidentally outing yourself bc u think ur being funny, forgetting to take ur meds, symptoms of antidepressant withdrawal, the foundation of this story is a Really Stupid joke
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:33:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27246589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueschist/pseuds/blueschist
Summary: In 1998, Rob Halford of metal band Judas Priest came out during an interview, later describing the incident as a "slip of the tongue."Many years later, Marufuji Ryo, widely known by the nickname Hell Kaiser, whose public persona draws inspiration from  Judas Priest’s aesthetic, makes a poorly-thought joke on a chilly Friday morning in mid-November after accidentally skipping his meds. Things go from there.TLDR:Hell Kaiser Ryo comes out in the style of Rob Halford (meaning: completely by mistake), has a heart-to-heart with his brother over text message, forgets to take his medication for over a week, and scares the living shit out of everyone.
Relationships: Marufuji Ryou | Zane Truesdale/Edo Phoenix | Aster Phoenix
Series: post-canon edoryo stories [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2044756
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17





	love you (when you're such a mess)

**Author's Note:**

> [oh your hands move like waves  
>  the sweat is dripping from your neck  
>  i've seen you in a hundred different shapes and shades  
>  fake until there's nothing left to fake  
>    
>  why don't you just throw out yesterday's dress  
>  i only wanna see you like this  
>  i love you when you're such a mess](https://youtu.be/OwBoux5qP88)
> 
>   
> this story, like everything else i write, started out as a joke
> 
> anyway  
> marufuji ryo is MY comfort character and I get to project my mental health issues onto him.

Ryo woke up slowly, the early afternoon sun shining through the window and casting a comforting beam of warmth through the otherwise chilly room. He’d always loved the way windows filtered the sun’s warmth in the wintertime, no matter what part of the world he was living in. He had the rest of the day off today, his only scheduled outing being earlier that morning for some sponsored event. Edo was out of the country for the week, so Ryo had their home to himself, which meant he was going to spend his time napping and playing european industrial music really, _really_ loudly. The condo was strangely quiet without Edo’s constant bitching.

His phone, still lying on his chest from how he’d fallen asleep, vibrated.

 _ **Asuka:**  
_ _uh. just thought u should know. youre trending on american twitter._

Oh yeah. Sometimes Ryo forgot that Asuka was also living in the States now, albeit as a grad student on the west coast. Lucky her. Ryo was currently stuck living in motherfuckin’ _New Jersey_ , which, like most of the american northeast, was an utterly miserable place to be. Didn’t matter that he and Edo could afford to live in New York City proper (or literally anywhere else in the country! like the west coast!), or that prior to moving here Ryo didn’t even know that New Jersey was a real place that existed. Edo, the tasteless bastard, _liked_ New Jersey.

 _ **Asuka:  
** _ _i_ _haven't seen it yet, but you apparently said something. uh. controversial. in an interview_

_**Ryo:**  
interview ? _

_**Asuka:**  
anyway! just something you should check out! _

He hadn’t given any interviews recently, had he? No. He opened up the twitter app and there it was; his name was definitely trending. He was about to tap it to see what it was about, but was distracted when the incoming call screen popped up. Edo was calling him. Ryo pressed the ignore button and went back to scrolling through post after post of... “Ryo Marufuji says bottom rights!”? Um, what the fuck...?

_**Eddy:**  
Um did you just DECLINE my call? _

_**Eddy:**  
How DARE you _

_**Eddy:**  
RYO _

Ryo kept scrolling. Why couldn’t these people just fucking retweet each other instead of making a new post every time? And did they REALLY need to tag his twitter handle? Ugh.

_**Eddy:**  
How is it that I’m out of the country for four days and you manage to say something stupid ON LIVE FUCKIGN TELEVISION and somehow I??? have to do damage control????? for you?? _

The incoming call screen popped up again. What didn’t Edo understand about the first time he got ignored?

**_Eddy:_ **  
_RYO. STOP DECLINING MY CALLS._

_**Eddy:**  
ANSWER UR PHONE _

Another incoming call. Ryo didn’t even look who it was before pressing ‘decline.’

_**Eddy:**  
Ryo pick up yuor FUCKIN PHONE or I s2g _

_**Ryo:  
**   
_

_**Eddy:**  
a meme? Really? a fucking meme? _

_**Ryo:**  
:) _

Another notification. Now his brother was texting him. Why was everyone bothering him today?

_**Sho:**  
hey. first of all; i hate you. second; there are at least three gay magazines that want to interview you. _

_**Sho:**  
lastly… do you just deliberately do these things to get back at me for something? is it because of that time I headbutted you in the face and broke your nose? is that why you do these things? to spite me, your wonderful little brother? _

_**Ryo:**  
you are. the opposite of wonderful. U R a devil _

_**Sho:**  
compared to you i am a shining beacon of virtue and hope _

_**Ryo:**  
a shining beacon of shit and garbage _

_**Sho:**  
no need to talk about yourself like that _

Ryo knew for a fact that Sho’s smart mouth was responsible for at least 40% of his anger issues. The other 60% of his anger issues could be chalked up to being easily annoyed and plain sexual frustration. He just couldn’t fucking win!!!

And why… would gay magazines want to interview him? Maybe he’d been playing up the fetish gear thing a bit too much…

_**Eddy:**  
I am never going to let you live this down. Sure, all the media buzz is annoying, but since it’s at your expense its fuckin hilarious. xoxo _

_**Ryo:**  
? _

_**Eddy:**  
LINK — hell kaiser interview nbc _

Ryo hadn’t done an interview with them, had he? He opened the link, which took him to a video on youtube. The video began, obviously filming outside the venue he’d been at earlier in the day. He was standing a ways away from the camera, bundled up in a coat and scarf, sunglasses shielding his eyes from view. When a reporter approached him, he lifted his sunglasses so they were perched on the top of his head. There were obvious bags under his eyes, and he blinked slowly. 

He remembered standing out there earlier, how his eyes had stung from lack of restful sleep. He’d had to go to the convention center early that morning to set up things for an amateur tournament his sponsors were holding. He’d stepped outside for a moment of fresh air and quiet, trying to clear his mind of how deeply _tired_ he was.

Watching the video, Ryo felt dread settle in his stomach.

The reporter turned to the camera and introduced him: “I’m here with one of the world’s top duelists and—”

He cut her off gruffly: “actually, I’m a bottom.”

The reporter was dumbstruck for a moment, eyes bugging out of her head. “Y-you can’t say that! This is live!” she sputtered, at which point the video feed cut back to the channel’s two anchors, who were staring at each other in bewilderment.

Ryo felt his heart drop. Oh god. He was never going to live this down. If there was any comfort, it was that the entire interaction was in english, which meant that hopefully his parents wouldn’t see it, and if they did, they wouldn’t understand the terminology. He might even be able to play the whole thing off as just a mix up of languages; english was his second language and even though he was pretty good at it that didn’t mean he never messed up. Never mind that he knew exactly what he meant as he said it. No one had to know that. They should cut him some slack, right? Right?

Oh fuck. Oh god. Not a single goddamn chance. Celebrity gossip was merciless about this kind of thing. Fuck! He was going to kill himself. He had to. There was no other choice. He needed to kill himself. If he was dead, he wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences of his own stupidity, and he definitely wouldn’t have to deal with Edo making fun of him for it for the rest of his life. 

No, no, no. He wouldn’t do that. That would be stupid. He liked being alive. Being alive was kind of fun, actually. He’d only just started to enjoy it.

_**Sho:**  
they seem to think i’m your publicist? i’m not. handle your own affairs. i am not here to coordinate whether or not you get photographed whilst decked out in fetish gear. _

Actually, maybe killing himself wasn’t such a bad idea. Similar to Edo, Sho thrived off of Ryo’s misery. Sho couldn’t make fun of him if he was dead. Except Ryo didn’t want to be dead. He’d moved past that stage in his life. Ugh, where were these thoughts even coming from? He hadn’t had suicidal thoughts for months now, he had his psychiatrist and sertraline to thank for that. 

_**Ryo:**  
sho…. pls stop. this is embarrassing enough without your commentary. i’m just going to play it off as a language barrier thing and be done with it _

_**Sho:** theyre willing to pay a lot. for the interview. _

_**Ryo:**  
is that supposed to change my mind? i don’t care _

_**Sho:**  
i mean since you already wear shit like that for free whats the harm in getting paid to do it for a magazine? with a professional photographer? _

_**Sho:**  
i know you love showing off your ridiculous fashion sense. it seems like a good showcase of your interests _

Okay, first of all; Ryo’s fashion sense was fucking stellar _._ Second, he— oh.

_**Eddy:**  
N E way cant wait 2 see u next thurs. <3 _

Ryo read the text from Edo and couldn’t keep himself from smiling a little. He typed out a quick reply:

_**Ryo:**  
<3 _

Despite himself, he was looking forward to Edo getting home. He had… admittedly been a little lonely without him. It was nice having someone to talk to.

Aw shit. His phone vibrated again. Another text message. About a month ago, he’d stupidly wished that his friends would text him more often. He didn’t think it would actually come to pass, let alone with everyone texting him _all on the same day._ Ryo wasn’t used to communicating this much even on good days.

_**Fubuki:**  
need to talk?? _

_**Ryo:**  
absolutely the fuck not, especially not with you _

_**Fubuki:**  
Wow, rude! _

_**Fubuki:**  
you seemed to have NO trouble spilling it to that reporter earlier, but to your long-time best friend? you wound me _

_**Ryo:**  
in what scenario would i ever need to tell you about my preferences? _

_**Fubuki:**  
lol yeah sure in what scenario would you ever need to tell a GODDAMN TV STATION about your preferences? _

_**Ryo:**  
fuck you! fuck you fuck you fuck you f uck you fuck yuo fuck y ou fu ck you FUCK YOU!!! _

_**Fubuki:**  
ew gross dude I’d just lie there :l _

_**Ryo:**  
sometimes i hate you so much _

_**Fubuki:**  
lmao u WISH u were in my league babey! :3c _

Correction from earlier; Fubuki was about 25% of his anger issues, Sho was only at 15 currently. The percentages often changed depending on how annoying they each were being, which could fluctuate greatly over the course of a given day.

...And speaking of the devil.

_**Sho:**  
oh nooo did i hurt your feelings again? ur not responding. _

_**Ryo:**  
sho i can’t. i can’t do those interviews. they're going to ask questions _

_**Sho:**  
thats… literally what an interview is, yes _

_**Ryo:**  
you know what i meant, you goblin _

_**Ryo:**  
they're going to ask if i have a partner and i _

_**Ryo:**  
i don’t want to out edo _

_**Sho:**  
wait i thought you guys were public? _

_**Ryo:**  
no _

_**Ryo:**  
there’s a lot of things you have to consider _

_**Ryo:**  
with the media _

_**Sho:**  
yeah i know i just assumed since you're engaged and you took him to meet our parents... _

_**Sho:**  
sorry _

_**Ryo:**  
no it was a fair assumption _

_**Ryo:**  
i mean i’m fine, since my fans are mostly either gay men or milfs. _

_**Ryo:**  
but edo… his fanbase is mostly young women and girls. people who find him attractive and fantasize about being swept off their feet by him. and milfs too, for some reason. _

_**Sho:**  
please. stop talking about milfs. _

_**Ryo:**  
hey, they're a key demographic. none of us would be here without milfs, show some fucking respect _

_**Ryo:**  
anyway, part of his appeal is that he’s young, single, and good-looking. there’s the fantasy that if circumstances were right, they could be with him _

_**Ryo:**  
if edo came out publicly, there's the risk of alienating his fans. it would shatter that fantasy. Ed being gay would mean that the circumstances were NEVER right, and never had been. _

_**Ryo:**  
while with me i’m already the cyberpunk leather fetish duelist so there's really nothing that could harm my image at this point. _

_**Sho:**  
sorry, i didnt know :\ _

_**Ryo:**  
coming out, and ESPECIALLY as my partner could ruin his ‘wholesome’ image _

_**Sho:**  
lol @ wholesome _

_**Ryo:**  
yea i laughed too when i heard it _

_**Sho:**  
it’s fucked that somehow being attracted to other men is less ‘wholesome’ than whatever _

_**Sho:**  
i mean straight people fuck too!! looking at all the people i know who already have kids indicates that straight people fuck a lot actually!!! _

_**Ryo:**  
yeah cos u wouldn’t know from experience huh. since ur single _

_**Sho:**  
one day you shall answer for your crimes _

_**Ryo:**  
even back home it wasn’t _

_**Ryo:**  
it’s not… _

_**Ryo:**  
being gay or bi is more of a punchline than it is an accepted way of being_

_**Ryo:**  
i guess no matter what society i’m _ _in, i’m a social deviant_

_**Ryo:**  
which on one hand is cool bc it affords me the privilege to do w/e the fuck i please. _

_**Ryo:**  
but on the other hand sometimes i just want to be … a normal person? someone who can fade into the background. having to constantly outdo myself is exhausting _

_**Ryo:**  
people follow me bc they want to see me one up myself. i’m like the lady gaga or marilyn manson of dueling. it's all about the shock value _

_**Ryo:**  
and if you try to make that into a pun i WILL kill you, btw _

_**Sho:**  
do not. EVER. compare yourself to lady gaga. you will NEVER be as good as her. _

**_Ryo:_ ** **_  
._._ **

_**Sho:**  
shes the only american pop star i keep up with so trust me when i say your vocal range is NOTHING compared to hers. _

_**Ryo:**  
wow. that hurts my feelings i think. _

_**Sho:**  
boo hoo _

_**Ryo:**  
well thanks. for cheering me up, a little bit _

_**Ryo:**  
i feel better now _

Ryo allowed himself to smile a little.

_**Sho:**  
you should talk to edo about all this _

_**Ryo:**  
i don’t see him for six more days _

Ryo typed out a :( but deleted it. He didn’t want Sho to think he was, like, emotionally attached to Edo or anything. Even if they _were_ engaged.

-

Media speculation only intensified with Ryo’s refusal to talk about the incident publicly, and tabloids had already begun speculating about Ryo’s sexual partners. Grainy photos taken of him with various other duelists, all innocuous in nature but twisted into ‘evidence’ by lousy journalists trying to make a quick buck. There were even rumors that he was dating _Judai_ , which, like, that ship sunk when Ryo graduated from Duel Academy but whatever.

It was no surprise that most pictures were of him and Edo; they did spend a lot of time together, after all. A few publications had even guessed (correctly) that they were an item. 

His close association with Edo Phoenix had cast the other man under the tabloid rumor mill’s suspicious eye; now there were questions about _his_ sexuality and the nature of his friendship with Hell Kaiser. The best and most strategic course of action would be for Edo to cut ties with him; that way he could get out of this situation with his reputation mostly intact.

Ryo didn’t want to entertain that possibility, but it was the most pragmatic option for Edo to take, and he would… understand if that’s what Edo chose to go with. Just thinking about it caused a cold feeling to settle in his gut, his limbs weighted down as if with lead.

As loathe as Ryo was to admit it, he really did love Edo.

He avoided checking any of his text messages for three days, just in case Edo had decided to break up with him already. What Ryo didn’t know couldn’t hurt him. Even looking at his phone filled him with dread and uncertainty about what the near future would bring. If he didn’t look at his phone then nothing bad would happen, at least not until thursday when Edo was back in the country. If he could avoid his phone until then, everything would turn out fine. That’s what his brain told him, and he was inclined to believe it.

He heard his phone vibrate in the kitchen, but didn’t get up from where he lay on the floor. It had been doing that all day, almost nonstop, and Ryo’s avoidance of his phone had transformed into an avoidance of the room his phone was in, because then he might be tempted to check it. The kitchen was off limits right now, as was the front door, which was next to the kitchen. His gut feeling told him that just looking in the general direction of his phone was surely a shortcut to calamity. 

Ryo continued to lay on the floor for what felt like hours, vacillating between a cloudy numbness and even cloudier despair. His brain would not shut up about it, reading to him an itemized list of everything that could possibly go wrong as a result of making a stupid joke to an interviewer while half asleep on a friday morning. His pulse reverberated through his skull, and there was a pressure beneath his cheekbones which made it impossible to get comfortable. He turned over so he was laying on his side, facing away from the doorway to the kitchen, and ground his head into the nearby wall to make the headache go away.

There was a banging sound, which Ryo realized was someone knocking at the door. It didn’t matter; he wasn’t gonna open it. 

The knocking started again, more insistent. Could whoever it was _please_ just fuck off? He was busy, and the noise was sending needle-jabs of pain straight through his eyeballs.

The knocking stopped, and Ryo was very thankful about it until he recognized the sound of a key being inserted into the lock.

It wasn’t Edo; he wouldn’t have knocked, and there were only a handful of other people who had keys to the condo: Sho, Saiou, and Saiou’s sister whose name Ryo had never learned. Mia? Well it was something, but he’d interacted with her just enough times that he couldn’t just ask about it now.

“Brother?” said Sho’s voice tentatively.

“What?!” he said as abrasively as possible.

“Oh, you’re alive. That’s good to know.” Sho said from the entryway.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Ryo asked just as Sho stepped into the room. 

“Why are you on the floor?”

“I asked first. Bed and sofa Too Hot. Floor Cold.”

“Seriously?”

“You didn’t answer _my_ question.”

He heard Sho sigh. “Ed’s freaking out; he thinks you’ve dropped dead because you haven’t been answering his calls and his text messages aren’t showing up as read.”

“Maybe he should’ve developed object permanence as a baby just like everyone else,” Ryo grumbled, “his problem, not mine.”

“Ryo!” Sho exclaimed, “he was _worried_ about you! _I_ was worried about you! I know you don’t answer your messages but you usually have the decency to _read_ them!”

Ryo felt a twinge of guilt; he’d been going out of his way specifically to avoid looking at his phone.

“He called everyone, hoping someone would be able to check up on you. You’re lucky I was already going to be in the area.”

“Why am I lucky? I was doing just fine without you here. Go away.”

“Oh, were you? Is that why you’re lying on the floor?” 

“Shut up. I’m _fine_.”

Sho ran a hand down his face. “The two of you are so fucking difficult. Where’s your phone? You need to tell Ed you’re OK.”

“You do it.”

“What?”

“Why can’t you just tell him?”

“But - he- What don’t you _get_ about it? He’s going to want to hear it from _you_!”

“Why?”

“What d’you mean _why_?”

“My presence in his life is only going to drag him down,” Ryo said, “I don’t want—”

“Did he actually _say_ that to you?” Sho asked, suddenly indignant.

“N-no.”

“You just decided that on your own, then.”

Ryo opened his mouth to reply but realized he had nothing to say.

Sho grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him onto his back. “God, you look terrible. Have you eaten?”

“Of course I have.”

His brother gave him a stern look. “An actual meal? Not just slim jims?”

Ryo wouldn't make eye contact, so Sho continued: “Slim jims aren’t a fucking meal; they barely count as food. You have to eat something decent.”

Ryo sat up against the wall and pushed his brother out of his space. “Ugh, just _go away_.”

“...You’ve been skipping your meds, haven’t you.”

Ryo glared at his brother. “What do you take me for? An idiot?”

Sho looked unimpressed. “When’s the last time you remember taking them?”

What a stupid fucking question. It was probably this morning or yesterday morning or maybe the morning before that. So what if he couldn’t remember the last time he took them, it’s not like he committed it to memory every single time! “I don’t see how that matters,” Ryo answered petulantly.

Sho groaned. “You’re sick because you’re in withdrawal from your antidepressants, you shithead!”

Ryo groaned. He didn’t want to admit that Sho was right, but Sho was probably right.

Sho fiddled with his phone a bit before handing it to Ryo: “I’m going to get you your pills and something to eat. _Don't move_.”

“Where the hell would I even go?” he yelled back. He was about to ask what the phone was for but was distracted by a frantic voice emanating from the other line; Sho had called Edo and put him on speaker.

“Sho? Did you find him? Is he okay?”

In the eight years they’d known each other, he’d never heard Edo sound so scared. Not even in the other world.

“Sho? Just… just say something. Please tell me he’s alright.”

It hurt hearing Edo sound like that; it hurt knowing that he was the reason for it. “It’s me. I’m okay,” he rasped.

Edo sniffled. “Ryo? What h-happened? I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for _days_. Why didn’t you—”

“He forgot to take his meds and fell into a depressive episode!” Sho yelled from the kitchen.

“Shut up!” Ryo yelled back.

“But you’re okay now?”

“Getting there.”

Edo sighed. “You really scared me. Nobody could get in touch with you. I thought—”

“I’m fine, Ed.”

“Well I know that _now_!”

Ryo shut up; he didn’t know what to say. Edo’s breathing was erratic and Ryo realized he was crying.

“Just- just give me a minute to calm down, okay? This has been… a really stressful couple of days.”

“...I’m sorry, Ed,” Ryo said and meant it. “I assumed that- it’s hard to explain. I thought you wouldn’t- Being around me isn’t… I don’t want to harm your reputation.”

“Ryo…”

“I avoided looking at my phone because… if you _did_ decide to break up with me… I wouldn't have to know about it until you got back.”

“Why would you think I was gonna break up with you?”

“I don’t know, the idea got into my head and wouldn’t leave.”

“Probably because _you’ve been skipping your meds_.” Sho said, now standing over him. He handed Ryo a glass of water and an orange pill bottle.

It made sense. His psychiatrist had told him that the sertraline would also help manage the incessant chatter that crowded his brain, “intrusive thoughts,” she called them. Apparently they were a manifestation of OCD or something. Ryo took two of the little yellow pills and downed the glass of water, placing the empty glass next to him on the floor.

“Is this about all the media attention on you after you made that stupid joke?”

“...Maybe.”

Edo sighed. “Well I’m… I’m just really glad you’re safe. I’m gonna… I’ll be home tomorrow night, just hang on until then.”

“I thought you were coming home Thursday?”

“I moved some things around and booked an earlier flight. I was really scared, Ryo, I didn’t know what had happened to you.”

“O-oh. I didn’t intend to worry you, I’m sorry.”

Edo laughed softly. “What did you think was going to happen? I knew something was wrong the second time my call was allowed to go to voicemail rather than being outright declined. Of course I was going to worry. I’ll call you before I get on the plane?”

“I’ll look forward to that.”

Ryo hung up first. He always did. He looked up to see his brother standing over him. “Can I have my phone back now?”

“Sho um… thanks, for worrying about me.”

“Yeah, yeah. You gonna get up off the floor?”

-

Edo arrived home just after 11pm. There was an unfamiliar car parked out front, which he guessed belonged to Sho. He found the two brothers in the living room, both asleep on the sofa, a documentary about a diving bell accident on a norwegian oil rig playing on the tv. Edo knelt next to Ryo and gently shook him awake. “Hey.”

“Ed…?” Ryo sat up slowly and rubbed at his eyes.

He squeezed Ryo’s shoulder. “Yeah. It’s me.”

Ryo yawned and got up to follow his fiancé into the kitchen.

Edo wrinkled his nose at what was on the counter. “We can afford better pizza than Dominos.”

“...I like Dominos.”

“You have zero food standards.”

“Nice to see you again, too.”

Edo heated a slice in the microwave and took a seat at the counter. He felt Ryo’s strong arms wrap around his midsection, chest pressed to his back. Ryo dipped his head to kiss Edo’s shoulder.

“Did you miss me that much?”

“No,” Ryo said.

“Yeah I didn’t miss you either.” He felt Ryo smile against his neck which made him smile, too. “So…” Edo said between bites of pizza, “wanna talk?”

Ryo spoke, voice still muffled by Edo’s shoulder: “Not really.”

“Well, we need to,” he said. He held Ryo’s arm against him where it was wrapped across his chest. “Are you feeling okay?”

“I’m feeling better.” Ryo released Edo and sat next to him at the counter. “I’m not… good, but I’m better.”

Edo smiled briefly. “Listen, Ryo, I… This is something I’ve been considering for a while, but I want to… to talk to you about it, first,” he said. “I don’t want you to think this is because of anything you did,” he added quickly, “because it’s not.”

Ryo sat up, a concerned expression coming over his features.

“I’m thinking of taking a sabbatical.”

Ryo’s expression morphed into one of confusion. “You know english isn’t my first language, right? What is a sa- whatever it is you just said?”

“You don’t know what a sabbatical is?”

“Should I?”

“It’s sort of like a break from normal work to do other things.”

Ryo narrowed his eyes. “You mean _vacation_? Why not just say vacation? I know what that one means.”

“No it’s different from a vacation,” Edo said. “It’s closer to like, quitting your job to pursue work elsewhere. Temporarily. Usually for like a year.”

“...You’re gonna quit dueling? Ed, if you’re trying to do this on _my behalf_ then—”

“Ugh, I already said that it isn’t about you! I’ve been thinking about it for a while, since even before this trip. I’ve been doing this shit since I was eleven; I’m honestly getting kind of burnt out. There’s other things in my life I’d like to focus on, things that my busy schedule doesn’t currently allow time for.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“You don’t have anything else to say?”

“I don’t know what _to_ say.”

“I’ve spoken with my sponsors; my contract with the league will be up in January. Then I can pretty much do what I want. I’ll still make professional appearances and such, I just won’t be dueling.”

“Are you sure this isn’t because of what just happened? I don’t want to be the reason that you—”

“Don’t be so self-absorbed, babe.”

“...Alright.”

“I’m not gonna say it wasn’t a factor in my decision, but I have been considering this for a while.” Edo looked away, unable to meet his partner’s gaze. “Getting to spend more time with you is just a bonus, but there’s other things I want to do as well.”

They sat in comfortable silence as Edo finished another slice of cheap pizza. Ryo’s food quality standards were almost comically low (Edo had witnessed the look of heavy consideration on his features after dropping ice cream on the dirty garage floor; he suspected that the only reason Ryo didn’t pick it up and eat it was because he was being watched); paradoxically, he was an excellent cook. Ryo was made up of little contradictions like that. Edo found it charming.

“For calling Dominos shit you sure are eating a lot of it,” observed Ryo, “you sure you don’t secretly like it or something?”

”Hey, Ryo?” he said sweetly.

”Hn?”

”Shut the fuck up.”

**Author's Note:**

> keep in mind that whenever i dunk on hell kaiser i'm really just dunking on myself. so like when i talk shit about dominos? i love their pizza. when i make fun of ryo for almost picking up a piece of ice cream off the dirty floor? i actually did, and i've done worse. when ryo forgets to take his meds for a week and spirals into a despondent mess of intrusive thoughts and self loathing? that was me in august and september. it was horrible. i did not eat any actual meals, just snack foods, and while i did take my meds, i was not consistent about it at all. so this is just me writing humorously about my own recent experiences through the lens of a fucking yugioh character.
> 
> i also want to say that i've fudged the timeline a bit. i think this story takes place in 2016, but if edo and ryo first met 8 years before then that would be 2008 (except gx starts in 2004) so this is an AU where everything is the same except three years later
> 
> also if you recognize which obscure tragedy i reference when theyre asleep on the couch then you get a prize. if you don’t then it’s best to stay ignorant because the pictures are what most would consider gruesome


End file.
